Jovan Kirovski is the only player who was unexpectedly left off the list of names eligible for the second stage of Wednesday's Re-Entry Draft. The list was 35 names long for last Wednesday's first stage and was whittled down to 32. Kirovski has apparently agreed to renegotiate his contract with the Los Angeles Galaxy.
Second Stage Of MLS Re-Entry Draft Features Most Of Same Players
This stage of the Re-Entry Draft is expected to be considerably more active than the first when just two players, Joseph Ngwenya and Aaron Hohlbein, were taken. In the first stage, players had to be picked up at their option price, which often means the players were due significant raises. In this stage, the picking teams are permitted to renegotiate terms.
If the teams and players can’t come to terms, the teams will retain rights of first refusal, but the players are free to seek other deals. The Re-Entry Draft and this small step toward free agency were two of the major concessions players won during their Collective Bargaining prior to the start of last season.
In previous years, if players and teams could not come to terms, the teams retained the rights of those players into perpetuity unless they chose to relinquish them. This considerably limited players negotiating power. While this is still a far cry from the free agency we see in almost every other American sports league, it does give MLS players an opportunity to test their market value.
While many of the players eligible for these drafts were not particularly attractive at their original option prices, almost every player would seem to have a decent chance of being selected in this draft where teams are essentially just picking players to earn a seven-day negotiating window. Among the particularly notable players available are former Designated Players Guillermo Barros Schelotto and Juan Pablo Angel, former Golden Boot winner Jeff Cunningham and former Best XI defender Jimmy Conrad.
List of eligible players
Chivas USA: Marcelo Saragosa, Alex Zotinca
Colorado Rapids: Claudio Lopez, Ciaran O'Brien, Peter Vagenas
Columbus Crew: Frankie Hejduk, Duncan Oughton, Gino Padula, Guillermo Barros Schelotto
DC United: Jaime Moreno
FC Dallas: Jeff Cunningham, Dario Sala
Houston Dynamo: Ryan Cochrane, Richard Mulrooney, Pat Onstad, Adrian Serioux
Los Angeles Galaxy: Dema Kovalenko
New England Revolution: Preston Burpo, Nico Colaluca, Cory Gibbs, Khano Smith
New York Red Bulls: Juan Pablo Angel, Luke Sassano, Carey Talley
Philadelphia Union: Fred, Chris Seitz
San Jose Earthquakes: Khari Stephenson
Seattle Sounders: Tyrone Marshall
Sporting Kansas City: Jimmy Conrad, Josh Wolff
Toronto FC: Nick Garcia
Chris Sharpe (League Pool Goalkeeper)
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